Nseries three new models introduced during Nokia Open Studio

Nokia has shown its strategy of pushing new models from N-Series
ever since they got announced. Until today we had 6 models in total.
Most of them are already available on the market, in Berlin during
Nokia Open Studio three more models were announced, which should
cover holes in product line-up, and create competition for other
products from other companies.

This event was held in traditional Nokia style, including a tradition
when Nokia gives out new handset during opening party to journalists
so they get acquainted with it during press-conference. This time
it was black Nokia N80. We already had a review of this device based
on prototype, this means that in nearest future we will update it
once we get commercial sample. Well, speaking briefly: this is an
interesting device, one of top solutions on today’s market. It’s
interesting to see how a special web-site was created prior to this
event, it had schedule of press-conference, several programs for
N80, any journalist had the chance to download them and use for
his own good, as well as get additional experience of this device.
Even greeting speech by Nokia was already pre-recorded in N80’s
memory, as well as several tunes. Company put maximal effort so
that all its participants could feel total potential of Nokia N80,
use its strong sides (instead of standard 128mb memory card, 2gb
one was put in every package). It turned out that by giving out
for temporary use N80 to every journalist, the company managed to
cover a lot of goals, main one was to show how new technologies
can be implemented in practice and used in daily activities. Believe
me, this presentation is worth a lot, since user sees what he likes,
and what not, he’s free to decide weather this device is cool or
not.

But let’s move on to presentation of new models and main ideas
that were spoken out by company’s representatives. Although, before
we move on to that part, let me show you a photo that shows a sign
which tells you the way to toilets. Sometimes branding of everything
everywhere turns out in amusing results. Trust me, there were no
N-Series phones inside WC.

In the beginning of presentation a lot of things were said about
part that Internet takes in daily life, and what role it has in
office. Another point was the way how PCs evolved, how big they
used to be, and how small they are now. Logical conclusion was statement
“Nokia N-Series is not only handsets, these are multimedia computers”.
One interface familiar to user allows getting access to completely
different services: television, e-mail, Internet, games, multimedia,
and so on.

In terms of design, newly introduced models, as well as previous
ones from N-Series are sort of hybrid phones. This puts certain
limitations to their design, since a maximally comfortable phone
that would fit various people (different physical parameters, palm
size for example) should be created, it should also be adapted to
consumer’s experience. Speaking in free retelling style, company
is worshiping Social Media, which means will of ordinary people
to self express. For example, if you take photos, later on put them
on remote server (like Flikr) – this is Social Media. You want not
only to save those photos on your device, but also share them with
the rest, show them to your friends and other people too.

No wonder that interest to such possibilities is paid by traditional
medias, like BBC. BBC’s spokesperson was Justen Dyche, who told
about company’s attitude towards mobile phones in his company. I’d
like to point out that at the moment BBC is actively pushing forward
free and paid features for mobile phones, and by this parameter
BBC is well ahead of its competitors and has great popularity. In
one of sections of BBC web-site you can try to become a reporter,
even if you don’t have special skills or devices. In case you become
a witness of some interesting event, you can take a photo of that
or make video clip, later on send it via e-mail or defined phone
number via MMS. BBC’s editors will decide if this material is interesting
or not, and in case if it is, it will be in today’s headlines. It’s
clear that even biggest news agency cannot have its reporters all
over the world, especially this becomes actual during crisis conflict,
which pops up unexpectedly. Usually people who are around at that
moment act as reporters, which provides bigger trust credit to reports
by viewers who are not professional journalists either. This is
the way things will be done in future. I think that most of you
had already noticed that in news programs you often see videos made
by cellular phone being shown, this does not look extreme or wild
nowadays, does it? Evolution of technologies gives new turn for
evolution of handset usage. Improving picture quality and remaining
compact size allows making shots that are good enough to be used
on television, and even paper press.

Part of BBC presentation was dedicated to thousands of images and
video clips being received daily, basically this is new type of
media. Russian news agencies have an open possibility to enter the
market now, it is not yet formed in Europe, this allows gaining
advantage now by becoming pioneer in evolving market.

From this we are moving on to models themselves. First phone is
Nokia N72. This model is special not due to what’s inside, but to
what’s outside and how this is positioned. This is the first handset
in N-Series line-up that has “fashion” element in it. Let me compare
this device to Nokia’s collections, latest L’Amour Collection for
example. For the first time we see a smartphone targeted for trendy
young people, who care about how their phone looks, not what it
can do. Past experience in this area is more of an attempt to see
what this market segment is capable of, not more than that. Great
success of Nokia’s L’Amour Collection initiated introduction of
such “fashionable” smartphone.

Nokia N72 adopts two cutting edge concepts of today – innovative
Nseries solutions and attraction of fashion device’s design. The
major advantage of the introduced cell phones over all the competitors,
as they claim, is music part. The entire trio has acquired XpressMusic
support, in other words capability of plugging in 3.5 mm earphones
through adapter, availability of online music uploading, Janus DRM
by Microsoft support (Windows Media Player 11 and older, synchronization
of music folders with the handset, songs purchasing on credit).
Nokia intensively shows itself off as a manufacturer dealing only
with top music powerhouses. To cut a long story short, the company
keeps referring us to Nokia N91, as all the new models, in fact,
haven’t too much of difference default sound wise (playback of a
music file without any extra effects). The distinctions lie in method
of storing data (hard drive or memory card), earphones and package.
Thus there are not so many new solutions to all these devices, actually
user gets excellent sound quality with any of them. As a matter
of fact, I have already warned you about this, yet only now this
has become official – the difference in sound quality is non-existent.

The N72 is similar to Nokia N70 in many ways – the list of improvements
includes only varied design and a couple of other adjustments, not
vital for potential users; that’s why we are going to cover only
the design side of the new device.

Nokia N73 flaunts its photo capabilities, providing a huge display
with 2.4 inches diagonal and a 3.2 Mpix CMOS camera module. The
smartphone is targeted at taking sharp shots and further sharing
of them via various networks service, for example Flickr. The optics
is of Carl Zeiss, production, with auto-focus enabled, yet without
optical zoom – only x20 digital one. The maximum resolution of a
single shot is 2048x1536 pixels allows the manufacturer to claim
possibility of getting photos 20x25 cm in size in photographic quality.

As to other innovations incorporated into the device, the mechanical
shutter applied in this one is not a rarity, but a unique case nowadays,
since most companies prefer using electronic shutter. The extent
which it will affect output shots is still to be examined, though
it appears to be another smart marketing move, like the one, announcing
replacing standard optics with Carl Zeiss glass lenses, nevertheless
they do not grant any obvious benefits as compared to good plastic
lenses. Worldwide famous brands make all the difference in course
of advertising company, persuading a certain part of possible consumers
to become loyal to the promoted device, even if the used brand resides
in a completely different sphere of industry.

Spec wise, The handset is pushed away for Nokia N80 as much as
possible, which carries a 3 Mpix camera, although without auto-focus
and with lens of plastic. I suppose they will manage to provide
sharp distinction in quality of taken shots of these two devices.
The N80 is more likely to remain a business model, since it supports
WiFi connectivity. Both phones run one and the same Symbian 9.1,
S60 3d Edition. The strength of the N73 is similarity to Nokia 3250,
Nokia N91 hardware wise and presence of a CPU working at 314 Mhz
on-board, while Nokia N80 is powered by an out-of-date CPU type,
providing only 214 Mhz. Therefore those who are not interested in
WiFi connectivity options should peer at this solution, furthermore
the device houses two stereospeakers on its upper rim.

The model will hit the stores in August without any delays, in
fact, all current Nseries handsets did – the platform is well-studied,
so there are no obstacles left to release it on time. The model
will be sold at the price of 450-500 Euro in three possible color
schemes - silver grey/deep plum, frost white/metallic red and frost
white/mocha brown.

Next Story in Video – that’s the slogan, Nokia N93 was followed
by. As you might have guessed the device is aimed at those who are
desperately seeking for splendid video recording quality on mobile
phones. Over at Nokia they ensure us that this very offering is
going to be the top one in terms of video capabilities in this year.

The model’s design reminds of Nokia N92 – the upper flip rotates
in two planes, thus it can be used as a compact video camera, the
principle always remains the same. The built-in optics in similar
to Nokia N73’s one on no account – the distinction manifests itself
when it comes to included 3x optical zoom function. The camera’s
specifications are provided by Carl Zeiss Vari-Tessar lens – 30
fps and VGA-resolution what is already pretty good for a handset.
Stereo-sound recording and digital picture stabilizer are also on
place.

Don’t get frustrated by the amount of available storage by default
– 50 Mb, as there is a slot for miniSD cards. A memory card with
the capacity of 2 Gb may contain up to 90 minutes of video with
all options set to maximum values. The device is armed with TV Out,
so that it can be linked up with a TV set and used for demonstrating
captured video clips. For those, who aren’t going to keep the video
files on the phone for a long time, there is a program for burning
them to a DVD disk.

When you hear talks of DVD video quality provided in this model,
keep in mind that this regards only played back files, not the ones
you record on your own.

The model is scheduled to begin shipping this August at the price
of 500-600 Euro.

Other announces featured three Bluetooth-handsfree sets. Those
were standard models without any groundbreaking technologies with
the exception of design and slightly increased life time. All there
offers will become available this summer - BH-700 will have the
price about 80 Euro, this is one those accessories, which weights
10 grams and is meant to be plugged in ear canal. The BH-600 is
equipped with a DSP processor, suppressing all outside noise and
according to the company’s representatives lasts for 170 hours in
standby mode, and in light of the fact this headsets is 18 grams
in weight, it’s quite good performance. Its price will be in the
range of 70 Euros. The last introduced mode, the BH-300 completely
lacks any peculiarities and obvious pros.

Short summary

The company has taken a very tricky step and slightly altered the
key points of the Nseries line-up, as now the devices offer top
functionality, and precious design (for example Nokia N72) – this
opens certain possibilities to extend current market share owing
to attracting previously uncovered audience.

The introduction of Nokia N73 is an obvious answer to the release
of Sony Ericsson’s flagships in June, namely Sony Ericsson K790/K800.
On the whole we witness another round of competition between two
giants, as it was in case of Nokia N90 versus Sony Ericsson K750i.
As to me, I think the real difference between qualities of imaging
capabilities of these handsets will reduce to miserable, what will
certainly stir up disputes.

By releasing its N93, Nokia has become the first manufacturer to
demonstrate a new possible direction of mobile market development.
In 2007 exactly video capabilities are promising to become the sticking
point, having replaced music options, which is extremely popular
nowadays. Other manufacturers have scheduled announcements of similar
solutions only for the second half of 2006, while such devices will
hit the masses only in the third quarter of 2007.

Pointing out noteworthy facts, I shall stress that a number of
devices were endowed with the label “computers”, not handsets –
it reveals the plots of the company to release a full-scale line-up
of tablet computers, and the intention of paving the way for this
is easily read. So when they will actually release their all-new
solutions, they will be able to claim that they have already dealt
in similar fields. A well thought-out and wise move, which will
help in taking over even larger market shares.